Michael Moore's Traverse City Film Festival runs July 30 through Aug. 4.File photo

A feature on Michigan's distilling industry, a Q&A with filmmaker Michael Moore and a look behind unemployment stats are among the stories that recently caught my attention.

Are there any stories that I haven't listed below that I should be including? Let me know in the comment section below.

• While Michigan already has established wine and craft beer industries, craft distilling is a growing trend in Michigan. Detroit Free Press reporter Sylvia Rector talked to distillery owners in Detroit, Traverse City and Ferndale for a feature on the business behind Michigan-made spirits.

• Flint native Michael Moore talked to the Traverse City Ticker about the new Bijou by the Bay theater that's opening for the Traverse City Film Festival, which kicks off today. The theater is housed in a historic museum on Grand Traverse Bay. Moore said he’d love to build venues like the Bijou and Traverse City State Theatre across the country.

• The Washington Post's Wonkblog highlights a recent report from the Century Foundation that shows the national decline in unemployment is mostly due to fewer people in the labor force seeking work. "Americans aren’t getting jobs. They’re retiring," the headline reads. Michigan is no stranger to the issue — an August 2012 report showed the state's employment-to-population ratio was at a near record low of 53.9 percent in 2011.

• An analysis of patents in Michigan found that corporate applicants with sizable portfolios are churning out "high-value patents," according to Crain's Detroit Business. While many patents came from the automotive industry, "top companies based on an analysis of patent value were staking out unique territory in medical and medical diagnostic devices, aerospace engineering, environmental sciences, alternative energy and refrigeration," according to Crains.

The findings are different than a February report from the Brookings Institution that found Michigan seems to be missing out on some perks of high quality patent activity, which is associated with higher productivity growth, lower unemployment and creation of more publicly traded companies.